2020/21 Carlo Ancelotti

[luuk_deventer]

The run of great wins (and performances) against Chelsea, Leicester and Arsenal have sharply improved the good feeling around the club but it becomes worthless unless Ancelotti is able to find some consistency.

I think many fans recognise that the team is short in several key areas in order to compete with the best teams, and the run of Southampton, Newcastle, Man United, Fulham, Leeds and Burnley were poor performances. 4 points from a possible 18 in those 6 games is not the form of a team in the top half of the table.

Unless Everton adds 2 or 3 quality players in January, we will probably struggle to finish inside the top six so our best chance of European Football will be winning a cup. That is why tonight is a HUGE game.

Everton are just three games away from European Football, even if it is only the new Europa Conference League, it will be exciting and show the ambitions of the club are bearing fruit. Come on you blues!

 

[Rooney_Tunes]

The run of great wins (and performances) against Chelsea, Leicester and Arsenal have sharply improved the good feeling around the club but it becomes worthless unless Ancelotti is able to find some consistency.

I think many fans recognise that the team is short in several key areas in order to compete with the best teams, and the run of Southampton, Newcastle, Man United, Fulham, Leeds and Burnley were poor performances. 4 points from a possible 18 in those 6 games is not the form of a team in the top half of the table.

Unless Everton adds 2 or 3 quality players in January, we will probably struggle to finish inside the top six so our best chance of European Football will be winning a cup. That is why tonight is a HUGE game.

Everton are just three games away from European Football, even if it is only the new Europa Conference League, it will be exciting and show the ambitions of the club are bearing fruit. Come on you blues!

Agreed; poor performances and not top half.

However, as you also allude to, beating Chelsea, Leicester and Arsenal , this is top 4, so lets hope we get more of the latter performances then we will really be in the mix.

 

[MikeH72]

The run of great wins (and performances) against Chelsea, Leicester and Arsenal have sharply improved the good feeling around the club but it becomes worthless unless Ancelotti is able to find some consistency.

I think many fans recognise that the team is short in several key areas in order to compete with the best teams, and the run of Southampton, Newcastle, Man United, Fulham, Leeds and Burnley were poor performances. 4 points from a possible 18 in those 6 games is not the form of a team in the top half of the table.

Unless Everton adds 2 or 3 quality players in January, we will probably struggle to finish inside the top six so our best chance of European Football will be winning a cup. That is why tonight is a HUGE game.

Everton are just three games away from European Football, even if it is only the new Europa Conference League, it will be exciting and show the ambitions of the club are bearing fruit. Come on you blues!

Why? Who do you think the top 6 will be?

 

[Death]

Have any of the bad bells calling out Carlo apologized yet?

@MikeH72 you are excused from this

No just the extremely insufferable...

‘I’m so so so so happy to be proven wrong’,

‘delighted with being wrong about this one, happiest lad in the world’,

‘What shame lad? I’ve laughably stuck the knife in on Carlo (one the best managers in the world) suggested he isn’t cut out to manage us for pages and pages at the first sign of a bad run, BUT I AM BUZZING LAD.’

 

[HumbleWedbetters]

What I was concerned about was he was persisting with players like Iwobi and Gylfi despite them looking awful.

What I'm delighted about is that he looks like he can improve players... This is huge. He looks like he's declutterred iwobis mind, told Gylfi exactly what he expects from him and we look a different side.

 

[JMT]

Why? Who do you think the top 6 will be?

Not in order but, Liverpool/Leicester/United/Spurs/Chelsea//City.
Leicester is a probably the one I'd go 50-50 depends on Vardy being injury free, We also have a good chance but it depends on the consistency and none of that stuff where we lost to Newcastle/Leeds/Southampton/United and dropping loads of points happening again.

 

[Saint Domingo]

The run of great wins (and performances) against Chelsea, Leicester and Arsenal have sharply improved the good feeling around the club but it becomes worthless unless Ancelotti is able to find some consistency.

I think many fans recognise that the team is short in several key areas in order to compete with the best teams, and the run of Southampton, Newcastle, Man United, Fulham, Leeds and Burnley were poor performances. 4 points from a possible 18 in those 6 games is not the form of a team in the top half of the table.

Unless Everton adds 2 or 3 quality players in January, we will probably struggle to finish inside the top six so our best chance of European Football will be winning a cup. That is why tonight is a HUGE game.

Everton are just three games away from European Football, even if it is only the new Europa Conference League, it will be exciting and show the ambitions of the club are bearing fruit. Come on you blues!

Not sure I understand this discounting of all the good run of form. It’s like saying we’d be walking the league if it wasn’t for that run of games. It doesn’t work the other way to say we shouldn’t be top half because of that bad run. We are both teams, capable of reeling off 4 wins in a row, but equally capable of losing back to back. Which is why we are where we are in the prem at the moment. I’m never sure what people want when they call for consistency. If that means beating the teams we should beat playing in a familiar style then we may as well get Moyes back. He’ll beat Leeds at home for you, but he also loses or draws at Spurs and Leicester away. Hitting patches of title winning form followed by some bad patches is arguably better than consistently butting a glass ceiling. I’d love us to be winning every single game but anyone can see this squad is never going to do that so I’d rather have a manager who can ride the good waves for as long as possible even if that means some bad losses on the way rather than one who just has a template for a mid 50s points tally like Silva.

 

[luuk_deventer]

Why? Who do you think the top 6 will be?

It is tough to say. We have a chance but I do not think you can make any strong predictions on something so open.

Liverpool, Man City, Man Utd, Chelsea and Tottenham will finish in the top five in some order, in my view. I think they will make up the top five because of the depth of their squads and the options they have. All have, at one time or another, been suggested as possible champions.

With the one remaining spot, we are playing well in the last few games, as are Southampton and even Aston Villa. But Leicester, having finished 5th last year, are probably the strongest team of the chasing pack. The league is so competitive and any team like Wolves or West Ham could also put a run of wins together to put their name in to the conversation too, even Arsenal if they change manager or buy more quality like Partey in January and get PEA back in form are capable of winning 4 or 5 games in a row to change things.

It is an exciting season in that respect.

 

[MikeH72]

Not in order but, Liverpool/Leicester/United/Spurs/Chelsea//City.
Leicester is a probably the one I'd go 50-50 depends on Vardy being injury free, We also have a good chance but it depends on the consistency and none of that stuff where we lost to Newcastle/Leeds/Southampton/United and dropping loads of points happening again.

All of those teams have also dropped points against lesser sides though, it’s not just us is it. I’m sorry to say but yes, we are going to drop points again some time this season. So are United, Spurs, Chelsea, Leicester etc, as they have been doing also.

 

[luuk_deventer]

Not sure I understand this discounting of all the good run of form. It’s like saying we’d be walking the league if it wasn’t for that run of games. It doesn’t work the other way to say we shouldn’t be top half because of that bad run. We are both teams, capable of reeling off 4 wins in a row, but equally capable of losing back to back. Which is why we are where we are in the prem at the moment. I’m never sure what people want when they call for consistency. If that means beating the teams we should beat playing in a familiar style then we may as well get Moyes back. He’ll beat Leeds at home for you, but he also loses or draws at Spurs and Leicester away. Hitting patches of title winning form followed by some bad patches is arguably better than consistently butting a glass ceiling. I’d love us to be winning every single game but anyone can see this squad is never going to do that so I’d rather have a manager who can ride the good waves for as long as possible even if that means some bad losses on the way rather than one who just has a template for a mid 50s points tally like Silva.

Consistency is about winning games you are expected to win, I think. Not winning every game I agree, but understanding that if you have ambition for the European places, you need to, mostly, get the results befitting a team in those positions.

If you win a game you are maybe not expected to win, as Everton did against the likes of Chelsea or Tottenham, then for me it is making sure you capitalize on that. If you do not, then the benefit gained in winning an important game is lost by dropped points to teams like Newcastle, Burnley and Leeds.

I agree that dropping points to those teams does not indicate that Everton are as poor as them, in the same way that beating one of the top teams does not indicate that Everton are as good as them. Even the best teams drop points in unexpected moments. I feel you have to balance the assessment of any team across a full run of games and try not to over react when results go for or against the team. No matter what, improvements are being made and these are only predictions at this stage.

 

[MikeH72]

Consistency is about winning games you are expected to win, I think. Not winning every game I agree, but understanding that if you have ambition for the European places, you need to, mostly, get the results befitting a team in those positions.

If you win a game you are not expected to win, against the likes of Chelsea or Tottenham, as Everton have, then for me it is making sure you capitalize on that. If you do not, then the benefit gained in winning an important game is lost by dropped points to teams like Newcastle, Burnley and Leeds.

Spurs dropped points against Newcastle, West Ham and Palace. Leicester dropped points against West Ham, Villa and Fulham. City dropped points against West Brom and Leeds. United dropped points against Palace and Arsenal. Talk me to me about how we’re the only side that drops points in games we’re expected to win.

 

[FTY]

All of those teams have also dropped points against lesser sides though, it’s not just us is it. I’m sorry to say but yes, we are going to drop points again some time this season. So are United, Spurs, Chelsea, Leicester etc, as they have been doing also.

Yep and it's a good sign that aside from Leicester, none of them have had anywhere near the players missing crisis that we have yet

 

[Shibbywiggles]

What I was concerned about was he was persisting with players like Iwobi and Gylfi despite them looking awful.

What I'm delighted about is that he looks like he can improve players... This is huge. He looks like he's declutterred iwobis mind, told Gylfi exactly what he expects from him and we look a different side.

He’s rightly lauded for turning DCL into a top finisher by simplifying his game and making it all about being in the box at the right time but turning Iwobi into a real threat going forward and also a player that tracks back and works really hard every game is remarkable. Only a short term success so far but I’d have him in future Everton squads now whereas before I’d have lashed him out the club quicker than most of the team.

 

[Lanolin]

Not sure I understand this discounting of all the good run of form. It’s like saying we’d be walking the league if it wasn’t for that run of games. It doesn’t work the other way to say we shouldn’t be top half because of that bad run. We are both teams, capable of reeling off 4 wins in a row, but equally capable of losing back to back. Which is why we are where we are in the prem at the moment. I’m never sure what people want when they call for consistency. If that means beating the teams we should beat playing in a familiar style then we may as well get Moyes back. He’ll beat Leeds at home for you, but he also loses or draws at Spurs and Leicester away. Hitting patches of title winning form followed by some bad patches is arguably better than consistently butting a glass ceiling. I’d love us to be winning every single game but anyone can see this squad is never going to do that so I’d rather have a manager who can ride the good waves for as long as possible even if that means some bad losses on the way rather than one who just has a template for a mid 50s points tally like Silva.

For me it's it would I want the same baseline of performance virtually every week. You might have a bad game and lose but then the week after you pick yourself up and get straight back to it. You're always competitive. Our problem in recent years has been that far too often we have peaks and troughs. It often seems like we're one bad performance away from having a horror run where we don't win for 2 months and that really isn't good. It's very difficult to get into the top 6 if you have extended runs where you don't pick up points, which is why we usually fall short. Even after the bad start last season, just before lockdown we were looking like we might sneak into a European spot after a good run, and then we only won 3 of the last 12. It's a familiar story with us. We've had one bad run this season, another one like that and we're going to struggle to be up there again; 4 points from our next 6 games and we're back in the bottom half basically.

 

[MikeH72]

Yep and it's a good sign that aside from Leicester, none of them have had anywhere near the players missing crisis that we have yet

People won’t acknowledge this though. They’ll jump straight on the “yeah but Arsenal were missing Aubameyang and Leicester were missing Evans” train but ignore the fact that we’ve been without 4 first teamers for the past 3 games.